The Emerald Window Decorator is a custom window decorator shipped with Compiz Fusion that allows for theming and full composite window decorations with the use of engines. Emerald allows for all sorts of different configurations and layouts of buttons, look, title bars and frames. Emerald Window Decorator is completely independent of any desktop, and you specify your own themes to use for it. The Decoration plugin must be enabled in order for Emerald Window Decorator to function.

Using Emerald

When launched, Emerald will replace your current window decorator with itself. The default theme is 'Beryl_Default (Beryl Red)', however this will probably change soon. To launch Emerald, use

This, of course, excepts the the pixmap engine which needs a few other files too.

Buttons

Buttons files contain pixmaps which in turn contain the buttons. They are specially structured.

The first 3 buttons make up the button that will be the button for the active window. The 3 buttons are essentially the 3 'stages' of the fade animation, so you can make your buttons animate slightly when they are hovered over. The animation will repeat itself if Use Button Fade Pulse is enabled. The last 3 buttons are used for inactive windows.

Theme.INI Structure

The theme.ini file contains a certain structure. It reads like this:

[theme] : This contains information about your theme such as the suggested widget theme, the version, description and creator. The user will see this information

[titlebar] : This contains settings for the titlebar layout, such as the default object layout, titlebar height, font and text color

[buttons] : This contains settings for the buttons, such as the layout and whether to use halo / glow

[borders] : This contains settings about the size of the borders

[shadow] : This contains settings about the size and shape of the shadow, how transparent it is and what color it is

[engine] : This contains a string mentioning what engine will be in use

[engine_in_use] : This contains engine specific settings, such as what color to use for the titlebars and frames.

Engines

Emerald Window Decorator uses Engines to do most of the work in theming the window borders, drawing the colors and gradients as well as pixmaps to surround the border. Below is a list of engines, a description of their settings and a description of the engine itself.

Legacy Engine

This engine is based on the original cairo engine of the GTK Window Decorator. It allows an 'outer' and 'inner' blend for a window's frame and titlebar. Below are the settings

For active windows

Outer frame blend defines what color and opacity the very outer frame has.

Inner frame blend defines what color and opacity the very outer frame has.

These two colors are mixed to give you a gradient that stretches over the window frame.

Outer Titlebar blend defines what color and opacity the very outer titlebar has.

Inner Titlebar blend defines what color and opacity the very outer titlebar has.

These two colors are mixed to give you a gradient that stretches over the window titlebar.

Titlebar Separator defines what color and opacity the black line between the titlebar and the window is

Frame Outline defines what color and opacity the outline around the window border is

Frame Highlight defines what color and opacity the highlight around the window border is

Frame Shadow defines what color and opacity the shadow around the window border is

Contents Outline defines what color and opacity the outline around the window content is

Contents Highlight defines what color and opacity the highlight around the window content is

Contents Shadow defines what color and opacity the shadow around the window content is

For inactive windows

Outer frame blend defines what color and opacity the very outer frame has.

Inner frame blend defines what color and opacity the very outer frame has.

These two colors are mixed to give you a gradient that stretches over the window frame.

Outer Titlebar blend defines what color and opacity the very outer titlebar has.

Inner Titlebar blend defines what color and opacity the very outer titlebar has.

These two colors are mixed to give you a gradient that stretches over the window titlebar.

Titlebar Separator defines what color and opacity the black line between the titlebar and the window is

Frame Outline defines what color and opacity the outline around the window border is

Frame Highlight defines what color and opacity the highlight around the window border is

Frame Shadow defines what color and opacity the shadow around the window border is

Contents Outline defines what color and opacity the outline around the window content is

Contents Highlight defines what color and opacity the highlight around the window content is

Contents Shadow defines what color and opacity the shadow around the window content is